There’s this great myth that when spring arrives, a bounty of ingredients comes with it. In actuality, spring ingredients find their way onto menus at a slow trickle. Outside of asparagus, peas, ramps, and other leafy greens, one spring arrival that packs amazing flavor and texture is the morel mushroom. A favorite of foragers, morel mushrooms taste downright meaty and will turn even hardcore carnivores into fans. It’s so popular that there are websites devoted solely to celebrating the sponge mushroom. Lovely with pasta and risotto or paired with almost any protein, mushrooms are an antioxidant and a good source of vitamins B2, B3, D, as well as copper, selenium, and potassium. Find out what OpenTable diners are saying about this fun fungi in recent restaurant reviews.

* Bartlett Pear Inn, Easton, Maryland: “Dinner there was excellent. The fresh morels and truffles were a delight.”

* Bluegrass Tavern, Baltimore, Maryland: “The food was terrific, and I would classify ourselves as foodies and picky. I had the morel and fava pot pie. It was silky and really punched the flavor on the morels.”

* Bouchon at The Venetian, Las Vegas, Nevada: “Amazing food! And the specials really are special! The morel mushroom and asparagus tagliatelle in lemon butter sauce was so good, I could have had three.”

* Golden Pheasant Inn, Erwina, Pennsylvania: “We shared a delicious kale salad with locally foraged morel mushrooms, and for entrees we had the shrimp and salmon. The food was exquisite, perfectly seasoned and prepared.”

To celebrate the end of the 2010 Diners’ Choice Awards season, we’ve saved the best for last. Literally! OpenTable is pleased to announce the winners of its 2010 Diners’ Choice Award for the Best Overall restaurants. Culled from more than 7 million reviews submitted by OpenTable diners for more than 15,000 restaurants in all 50 states and the District of Columbia, restaurants from 22 states and the District of Columbia made the list, with California restaurants making the most appearances (eight!) and pushing New York into second place (just seven restaurants versus last year’s nine!).

Events

Caroline Potter is the Chief Dining Officer for OpenTable, Inc. She’s a dining trend-spotter and an OpenTable VIP, who dines out more than she eats in and has accrued more than 10,000 Dining Rewards points. Caroline started working in restaurants as a teen and she’s since tackled every front-of-the-house job, from bartender and hostess to runner and server. She trained as a chef at Manhattan’s prestigious French Culinary Institute, cooking at L’Ecole. In addition to her role at OpenTable, she has written about food from farm to table for New York City’s famed Greenmarket and Edible Brooklyn and Edible East End magazines. Caroline is also a Certified Master Gardener.